Class Trip II

by Bebe Faas Rice

  “I bet it’s one of those little old towns with a village green and everything,” Becky said dreamily. “I heard there are a lot of them in this part of the state, and some go way, way back. To the sixteen hundreds, even.”

  The road began to narrow again, and Adam had to zigzag around the deep potholes that pocked the road.

  “Whoever’s responsible for road repair must have run out of money right about here,” he said, barely missing one deep pit, and hitting another that flung them against their seat belts.

  They all breathed a sigh of relief when they found themselves on flat ground once again, the mountain safely behind them.

  They seemed to be in a valley now. Mountains rose up around them on all sides, and Hallie, craning her neck, looked back on the one they’d just come down. The road looked even more winding than she’d realized.

  The mist had disappeared, but twilight was coming on quickly. The sides of the road were now heavily treed, cutting out what light remained. Adam turned on his headlights.

  Hallie felt a deep, unreasonable sense of depression.

  “Where’s that little town we saw from up on the mountain?” Becky asked. “Didn’t that man say it would be down here someplace?”

  “It can’t be much farther,” Adam said. “We’ve twisted and turned so much coming down the mountain, I’m not sure where it is.”

  They continued on for several more miles, seeing no signs of habitation, the road narrowing down into little more than a country lane. The van sputtered to a halt a couple of times, but Adam managed to get it going again by stopping on the shoulder of the road, raising the hood and banging on the motor.

  Finally Adam stopped the car. He leaned forward and peered through the windshield.

  The road had dead-ended into what looked like a primitive dirt road running in both directions. A quaintly lettered sign that said holyoake, population 400 was nailed to a tree, with an arrow pointing to the right.

  “Holyoake?” Hallie asked. “Is that the name of the town with the gas station and the telephone?”

  “Yes, I think that’s what the man said,” replied Becky.

  “Let’s not be picky,” Adam said. “Any town will do.”

  The van made feeble, protesting noises as Adam eased it slowly onto the old dirt road.

  “Hang in there, good buddy,” he pleaded, patting the dashboard. “We’re almost there.”

  Overhead, tree limbs met and entwined, creating an enclosed avenue and lending a feeling of unreality to the scene. After they had driven for a half mile or so, the overhanging trees disappeared, and the road ended abruptly in a clearing at the edge of a small town.

  No, town wasn’t the right name for the little cluster of houses up ahead, Hallie decided. That was too modern, too contemporary a word. Holyoake wasn’t a town. It was a village. A quaint, picturesque little village.

  Hallie felt the hairs on her arms rise for some strange reason.

  Down the street a man was lighting the old-fashioned gas lamps that lined the village green.

  A real village green. That ought to satisfy Becky, Hallie thought.

  The houses that fronted the streets were all early colonial, all wooden, and uniformly painted white, with fanlight windows over the front doors.

  “I was right!” Becky said excitedly. “These houses are definitely pre-Revolutionary!”

  At that, the van expired. No amount of revving and cajoling could bring it back to life.

  “That’s it, I’m afraid,” said Adam, taking the key from the ignition.

  “Is it something serious?” Hallie asked.

  “Probably not. Any good mechanic ought to be able to put it back in business again. It breaks down all the time, as you’ve probably noticed.”

  “Well, I’m glad it hung in there long enough to get us to civilization,” Becky put in.

  Adam got out of the car and looked around. “Let’s hope this is civilization and that the weird-looking building up ahead is a gas station.”

  Hallie and Becky peered through the gloom in the direction he indicated. The building was flat-fronted, with a peaked roof and a large bay window. It appeared to be half country store, half gas station, with assorted wares displayed in the window and antiquated-looking gas pumps out front.

  “I’ve only seen pumps like that in World War Two photos,” Hallie said. “Do you think these are still working?”

  “They’d better be,” Adam said. “The van needs gas, along with everything else.”

  With Becky steering, Hallie and Adam pushed the van the few remaining yards down the street to the store.

  No sooner had they pulled up beside the pumps than two middle-aged women in shapeless, unfashionable dresses emerged from the store.

  They were obviously customers, Hallie noted, as they were carrying baskets of groceries on their arms. Baskets rather than paper bags. How unusual, Hallie thought. But she knew Becky would love the old-fashioned baskets.

  Both women seemed surprised to see Hallie and Adam, nodding silently at them and regarding them intently from under lowered lashes. Hallie realized then that they probably didn’t see many strangers out here in this remote place.

  The women lingered in front of the store, adjusting their baskets, still watching Hallie and Adam from the corners of their eyes. Hallie almost laughed aloud at their furtive inspection.

  Becky opened the door of the van and stepped out.

  What happened next was puzzling.

  The two women froze in midmotion and stared at Becky. At her pale, creamy skin. At her mane of blazing red hair.

  Becky, who was gazing, entranced, out over the Green, watching the lamplighter as he moved from gaslight to gaslight, didn’t notice the women’s startled reaction.

  But Hallie did. She reminded herself again that people usually took a second look at Becky, because she was so pretty and because her hair was such an unusual color. But not like this, not like Becky was some kind of freak. Those two women were acting downright weird. The way the man on the road had.

  Hallie edged closer to Becky and glared at the women, who were now looking at each other, exchanging unreadable glances.

  What’s going on here? Hallie thought. Am I overtired? I must be imagining things.

  The older of the two women turned to Adam, who had opened the hood of the van and was peering helplessly into its entrails. “Is there something wrong with your machine?” she asked.

  Machine? What a peculiar thing to call Adam’s van.

  The woman spoke with the same sort of accent the man on the road had. That same odd, old-fashioned way of pronouncing vowels. Maybe it was it a regional thing.

  “Is something wrong with your machine?” the woman repeated.

  Adam pulled his head out from under the hood.

  “You mean my van? There sure is,” he said. “I hope you’ve got a good mechanic in this town.”

  “Oh, there’s no one better than our Norman,” the second woman said. “I’ll go get him for you, if you wish.”

  This one spoke just like the other.

  “Thank you,” Adam told her. “I’d really appreciate it if Norman would take a look at this motor.”

  Becky reluctantly tore her gaze from the lamplighter and turned, smiling, to the women.

  “Norman?” she asked, oblivious to the way they were looking at her. “Who’s Norman?”

  They exchanged another unreadable look before the younger one answered. She seemed surprised Becky even needed to ask the question. “Norman’s very important to our village. He runs this store and gas station. And takes care of the village fire engine. He knows everything there is to know about machines and all those modern things.”

  Machines? Modern things? Hallie wondered if this poor woman had ever heard about the space program. Or television. Did they even have radios in this place? And are we in the Twilight Zone or what?

  When the older woman went back into the store to get Norman, the other mumbled something about having an
appointment with the minister and struck out across the Green in the direction of the church.

  Hallie, watching her, was amazed at how quickly she was walking, considering the heavy basket she was carrying.

  Ages seemed to pass, however, before Norman appeared. At one point Hallie thought she heard the faraway ring of a telephone and assumed he was tied up with a phone call.

  “Don’t forget,” she reminded her friends, “we’ve got to call Mr. Costello as soon as we find out what’s wrong with the van.”

  Norman finally emerged from the store, followed by the older woman, who nodded to them and promptly scooted off in the same direction her friend had taken.

  Norman was a rumpled-looking man dressed in baggy overalls. Hallie wondered where he bought them. She’d never seen anything like them before—they looked like something out of the Great Depression. Norman was briskly businesslike, although his glance did rest a little longer than necessary on Becky, Hallie thought. Hallie was almost certain that his eyes narrowed when he looked at her friend, but at least he didn’t gape at her the way the two women and the man on the road had.

  Norman disappeared under the hood of the van and rummaged around for a long time, wiggling and testing things. Finally he resurfaced and closed the hood gently, wiping his hands on a towel that hung from his pocket.

  “I’m afraid I’ve got bad news,” he said. His accent was just like that of the two women.

  “What do you mean, bad news?” Adam asked, his forehead puckering with worry.

  “It’s going to take me quite a while to get that machine running again,” Norman said.

  “How long?” Adam asked.

  “I’m afraid I can’t have it ready until tomorrow evening at the very earliest. Maybe not even then.”

  “Tomorrow evening?” Hallie repeated, aghast. “But tomorrow’s Saturday, and the festival’s over on Sunday. Our weekend will be ruined!”

  “I can’t believe it,” Becky moaned. “What are we going to do now?”

  “It’s all my fault,” Adam said. “I should have had that motor overhauled before we left home.”

  Hallie glanced at Norman and was startled by the expression on his face.

  He didn’t look at all sympathetic. In fact, he was watching them the way the man on the road had, with a half-smile on his lips, as if he were secretly pleased about something.

  Chapter FOUR

  The look vanished in the blink of an eye, and Hallie wondered if she’d imagined the sly smile and the secret, gloating expression.

  She’d been having these paranoid feelings all afternoon. Ever since they’d gotten lost, in fact. Hallie frowned. She wasn’t usually like this.

  Adam was looking at her and Becky. “Well, you heard the man. Anybody have any ideas?”

  “First of all,” Becky said, “we’ve got to call Mr. Costello before he calls our folks. You know my mother. She’ll go bananas if she thinks we’re lost.”

  Norman looked uncomfortable when they asked him if they could borrow his phone.

  “You can put the call on my repair bill,” Adam said.

  Norman shifted from foot to foot and scratched the back of his neck. “It’s kind of embarrassing to admit this to city folk like you, but our phone system here in Holyoake is pretty old.”

  “It doesn’t matter what your phones look like,” Hallie said. “Just as long as we can call out to let our folks know we’re okay.”

  “That’s what I’m getting at,” Norman replied. “You can’t. The phones are down.”

  “What do you mean, down?” Becky asked.

  “Well, ah—” Norman coughed and shuffled his feet again, looking at the ground. “We had a bad electrical storm yesterday. It . . . it knocked out the phone lines. It happens all the time—the phones break down whenever there’s a storm. It’s never a big problem to us, though. None of us need to call The Outside very often.”

  The Outside? Hallie thought that was a strange way of referring to people in the surrounding towns. If there were surrounding towns in this remote valley.

  “If the phones aren’t working, we’re in real trouble,” Adam said. “How long do you think it will take before they’re fixed?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. A day or two, maybe,” Norman said with a shrug, still looking down at his feet.

  “A day or two?” Hallie’s voice was shrill. “I can’t believe this. There’s got to be some way of contacting—” She almost said, “civilization,” but managed to bite the word off just in time. Suddenly she remembered the faraway ringing she’d heard earlier.

  “Are you sure the phones are down?” she asked. “I could have sworn I heard a phone ring in your store a little while ago—just before you came out.”

  “No, you couldn’t possibly have heard anything like that,” Norman hastily assured her, shaking his head vigorously. “Like I said, the lines are all down. Maybe you heard my timer. I was boiling up a dozen eggs on the hot plate. Some people like to buy them that way.”

  He looked up at her when he spoke, his eyes blue and guarded. With a shock Hallie realized he bore a distinct resemblance to the man they’d met on the mountain road. Same blue eyes. Same facial structure. Same build.

  She thought about asking him if he had a cousin who owned a Model T Ford but decided against it. Surely the man back there would have told them if he had any relatives in Holyoake. In fact, he hadn’t seemed to know much about the town at all.

  Instead she said, “But we’ve got to get in touch with our folks as soon as possible. Maybe we could send a wire. Is there a telegraph office in town?”

  “A what?” Norman said blankly.

  And this is the man who knows all about machines and “modern things”? Hallie thought in disbelief.

  Adam took over the questioning.

  “Look, Norman,” he said. “Here’s the situation: we were supposed to be at Harrington College this afternoon. I guess you know where that is.”

  Norman looked doubtful. “I might have heard of it, maybe, but—”

  “The problem is,” Adam continued, “if we don’t show up by tonight, people are going to worry about us. Is there any way we can get to a town where the phones are working?”

  “A bus, maybe?” Becky asked.

  Norman laughed aloud. “Oh, no, little lady. There aren’t any buses hereabouts. Not many outsiders come to Holyoake, and we natives don’t travel much. We like it right here.”

  Becky looked over at the Green and sighed wistfully. “I can see why. Holyoake is so beautiful. It’s like stepping back in time.”

  “Well, maybe someone could give me a lift to the nearest town,” Adam suggested impatiently. “I could make a couple of phone calls and then come right back.”

  When Norman didn’t reply, he added hastily, “I’d pay him, of course. Just like a taxi.”

  “That’s not the problem,” Norman said. “We’d do it for you free, if it was possible. It’s just that few people around here even own a motor car.”

  “You’re kidding!” Adam said. “How can anybody survive without a car?”

  “We’ve got just about everything we need right here within walking distance,” Norman explained. “Holyoake’s kind of like a commune. We share everything, grow most of our own food, and make a lot of things by hand, so we don’t have to go Outside much.”

  “A commune? You mean, one of those Hippie things they used to have back in the sixties?” Hallie asked.

  “Well, in a way. Our people have lived here in Holyoake for a long, long time, so most of us are related by blood. That’s why living like this works for us. We think of ourselves as one big family.”

  “Isn’t that nice?” Becky put in. “This place is so darling.”

  “Look, surely someone’s got a car I can use,” Adam said.

  “Like I told you, son, we don’t have many cars here. Half of them don’t work, anyway. And even if they did, everybody’s pretty busy with the May Day festival—or Beltane, as we village folks call i
t—that’s coming up on Sunday.”

  Norman fiddled absentmindedly with the towel that hung from his overalls before he continued. “It’s not that we’re inhospitable or unfriendly. It’s just that Beltane is a pretty big social affair for us, and everyone’s rushing around like crazy, trying to get things done.”

  “So that’s it?” Hallie demanded incredulously. “It will be days before we can leave Holyoake, and there’s no way of letting our folks know where we are in the meantime?”

  Norman raised both hands, palms out, as if he were trying to keep Hallie from running off. “Now don’t get all worked up, young lady. I think I have the answer to your problem. Could somebody make your call for you?”

  “Sure,” Becky said. “Just so people know we’re okay.”

  “Well, Netty Talbot—she’s our town librarian—has been talking about having to go to the county seat to pick out some books for the school library. It wouldn’t take much to persuade her to go tonight. She likes to get there the night before, anyway, so she can start in early the next morning. But she’ll be staying in town all day, so I don’t think one of you would want to go with her. I know she’d go tonight, if she thought she was helping you out.”

  “But this is pretty short notice, isn’t it?” Becky asked. “I mean, with the festival and everything.”

  Norman shook his head and smiled. “If I know Miss Netty, she’s done all her work for the festival in advance. And she’s a spinster lady, so she doesn’t have children or a man to worry about.”

  Spinster lady? Hallie thought. There are still places in the world where a single woman is called a spinster lady?

  “Are you sure about this?” Adam asked eagerly.

  “Yes, she’s been talking about going for a couple of weeks now. This will give her a good excuse.”

  “What about a car?”

  “She’s got the little roadster her father left her. I just overhauled it, so she’ll be wanting to try it out.”

  “I’ve got Mr. Costello’s emergency number at the college,” Becky said, reaching into the van and pulling out her carryall. “As long as he knows we’re okay, he won’t call our parents.”